Paying His Respects
by Blue Star Galaxy
Summary: Spike decides he needs to do something when he hears about Joyce's death. But what do vampires know about buying flowers? It's only funny in a pitying way.


All right, none of these characters belong to me, they belong to Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy, blah blah blah blah blah.  

Takes place right in there with The Body, when Spike walks up to the house with flowers.  I just backtracked and took it from there.  On a personal note, this is my first story here, and I would enjoy all kinds of feedback, positive, constructive, whatever.  That said, on with the story!

He hesitated before entering the small store.  He felt odd.  He wasn't sure what it was he was feeling.  Sadness, after a fashion.  Regret, remorse, perhaps.  Grief, possibly.  A sense of irony, dimly.  Pain, certainly.  

He had never done this before.  Not in his two hundred sixty-three years as a vampire, and not in his twenty-five as a human.  He hadn't been close to her at all.  But she had been kind to him, and that meant something, and now he hurt.

He paid for the best flowers he could find, well aware that they weren't right.  He'd bought flowers for love – or just lust – many times, but grief, or sorrow, or whatever these were for… that he was less familiar with.  He knew he could have found something in one of those big, fancy, modern supermarkets, but that didn't seem right either.  Their arrangements were too gaudy, somehow, and that didn't fit.  Joyce had never been gaudy.  Also, the bright lights and crowds made him uneasy.  He didn't like crowds when there weren't shadows, too.  It unnerved him.  The possibility that it was his own weakness that made his offering so meager disgusted him, but he couldn't help it. 

So he found a little store he'd bought booze at once or twice, which he remembered also had a small flower selection.  A very small one.  It made his decision no easier.  What kind of flowers did you get a person who would never see them?  Did you get ones you liked, or thought they would?  And how did you know what kind they would have liked, if you had never asked them?  He almost asked the store clerk for his opinion, but couldn't bring himself to.  He began to grow desperate.  For some reason, he had to do this _now_.  _She's dead!_ He screamed to himself.  _She has all the bloody time in the world!_  It made no difference.  The feeling of urgency persisted.  

He grabbed the daisies.  They were simple, and pretty, and he thought Joyce might have liked them.  The clerk barely looked at him while he scrounged for money in his pockets.  He'd been running low for a while now, because Buffy hadn't paid him for anything in a while now, and he'd never been good at managing his money.  He could have nicked some money, but even he could see the wrong in paying for a dead woman's flowers with stolen money.  It wouldn't have been respectful, and Joyce would have yelled at him, he knew.

He headed off to the house nervously, feeling foolish, like a child with a handful of roadside weeds, presenting them like a dozen roses.  Only he was able to see how pitiful it was.  He brushed them nervously against his side.  He didn't have a plan.  He wasn't even sure what one _did_ with flowers.  Gave them to the relatives, he supposed, and cringed at a picture of him offering his measly flowers to Buffy.

He'd just leave them, he decided.  But what if someone misunderstood?  He didn't like just leaving them on the porch.  It felt too much like he didn't really care, that he was just stopping by, a casual thing.I_ know_, he thought fiercely.  I_ know, and I know I'm doing it for Joyce._  And since he was well aware that hell existed, maybe heaven did too.  He hoped she was enjoying it.  It had always sounded nice. 

He turned the corner, to see Willow and Xander standing in front of the house.  Oh no.  He didn't want to deal with anyone now.  He was having enough trouble with himself.  He hesitated, then lowered his head and continued walking.  The witch might be all right – she hated and sided with him by turns – but the whelp was sure to be trouble.  _It's not about _them_, _he told himself.  _It's about Joyce_.  

"Where do you think you're going?"  He wasn't going to get into it.  Not here, not now.  

"Paying my respects," he said shortly.  "Don't worry; I'm not going in."  That would be a real disaster, he knew, if it wasn't already.

The boy took an aggressive stance.  Spike smelled grief, and anger coming off him in waves.  "You cannot get at Buffy through this."

"It's not about Buffy," he snarled, ashamed to find his hand shaking.  He was fast losing his willpower to be there; much longer and he'd bolt.  He wasn't used to this sort of thing.  "I _liked_ the _lady_," he said voice strained.  "She was _nice_ to me.  She invited me in – and she made a nice cuppa."  He couldn't resist one bitter jab, especially as he could see he was losing.  "Plus, she never made me feel like a freak."  

The word hung in the air for  a moment, cut off sharply, and he stared down the boy.  He was annoyed to see no reaction there, and a little guilty to see Willow looking uncomfortable.  He'd been aiming for the boy.  

"You're sick, you know that?"

"Xander –" she started, moving forward to say something.

"No," he cut her off.  "Don't you see?  It's just another twisted ploy to get at Buffy.  Well, I won't let you.  Not like this."

He glared at the human, angry words working his mouth.  He couldn't find the right ones to express his utter despisement of the kid, his sense of injustice, not that he had even realized up till now that he had one.  In the end, none of the biting words emerged.  

"You know what?  Forget it."  He threw down the flowers in defeat, a sense of betrayal rising in him, because he knew he hadn't done her justice.  Somehow, he had failed her.  He stormed off, throat tight.  He could feel their eyes on his back, and the darkness seemed a little more dark tonight.  

He headed down to the demon section of town, and beat up a Pheld demon for some money.  The violence let loose something in him that he understood, finally.  That wildness, darkness, he understood, better than the uncomfortable feelings plaguing him all the earlier night.  He headed back to the flower shop, and picked up a bottle with the highest proof he could find.  He was a failure at this.  He might as well go all out on something he knew he could do well.

He headed back to his crypt.  It was time to get lacquered.  


End file.
